The lizardman warrior curled his hand into a fist, the papers crinkling loudly as he balled them up. His entire body seemed to curl in on itself, his budding rage palpable in the quiet chamber. Jarek Ko’s front hall hosted a highly polished oak blank flooring with almost no ornamentation beyond a handful of weapons set in brackets along the walls, the open space used for his own practice and the training of his men when he saw fit to invite them to his abode. Talya, having secured the services of a talented magic wielder, had used a scroll to teleport herself to his residence in downtown Ja-Wen as soon as she’d gotten tipped off by her woman in the wire service and read through the report. She thought the venerable warrior would want to see it himself before it hit the papers.
“This is pure slander,” he growled, tossing the balled papers toward the open grate of a fireplace set in the west wall of the chamber, composed of raw gray stone. “When did this go over the wires?”
“Four hours ago,” said Talya, sliding toward one of the curved blades Ko had put up on the wall. She idly drew one finger along the finely polished wood of the handle. “The Desanadronian has already agreed to run the story in their main imprint.”
“Which means that either The Ja-Wen Sun or Eastern Speaker will be running this trash as well,” grumbled Ko. He folded his arms over his bare chest, the green-and-brown scales looking faded, worn down. “Likely one of my competitors, pushing falsehoods to take me down a peg. I knew it would come eventually, but like this? From Graneck?”
“Yes, from Graneck,” said Talya, gracefully wheeling back toward her fellow Savior and striding away from the weapons wall toward him, her eyes locked on the balled up paper in the cold fireplace. As she drew up beside him, she planted one hand on her right hip, the other upon the mantle. She didn’t bother trying to pose herself in any sort of alluring position to gain his attention; Jarek Ko was what many referred to as a ‘race purist’, meaning he would not mate with any woman outside of the lizardman species. She couldn’t tempt him that way. “Tell me, Jarek, how many people have you employed from that shitsplat little kingdom since forming your company?”
“Perhaps eight, maybe nine,” he replied, still glowering down at the papers. “I don’t always keep track of recruitment.”
“Okay, so eight or nine people from the entirety of that kingdom. And did any of them really stick out in your memory?”
“Just one,” he said, finally looking her in the eyes, angling himself to face her squarely. “A hume, calls himself a technix, whatever the hells that means,” he added, flapping one hand dismissively. “I remember him quite well because despite his rather narrow frame, he proved quite adept at using tools and machines to provide himself with offensive and defensive capabilities in battle. Name’s Gordon Hamish.”
“Okay, so, one technology user, but none of the others are memorable. Answer me this then; why are you so certain this story is coming from one of your competitors?” Ko walked away from her toward the weapons wall, snatching up a long-handled spear, one that was very familiar to Talya; it had been his weapon of choice throughout the conflict against the forces of Pel Droma. He began going through a set of slow, steadied maneuvers in the air, keeping himself neutral in stance, neither aggressive or passive.
“One of the people from The Iron Blade Brotherhood as much as threatened to do something like this a couple of months ago,” Ko said, grunting as he thrust the spearhead forward. “He came by here with an offer from his employers, they wanted to buy me out but keep me on their payroll as an administrator. When I told him I wasn’t interested, he said that if I wasn’t careful, I wouldn’t be able to get my outfit off the ground, that my reputation was all I had going for me, and wouldn’t it be a shame if something happened to that.”
Talya, taking a cross-legged seat on the floor just out of the range of his practice motions, nibbled on her thumbnail thoughtfully. It was a possible explanation, she supposed, but one thing was off about it. “That man from the Iron Blade Brotherhood, he came to see you here, right?”
“Of course,” said Ko. “They’re based out of the city.”
“Do they have any branches in Graneck?” The lizardman paused, stood upright with the blunt end of his spear on the floor.
“No, they don’t.” He held his spear out, staring at the worn, scarred head of the weapon. “You think this is personal, then? Someone from the war?”
“I do,” Talya replied. “Possibly the very same goblin who was said in the report to have bested your man there. Greenskins aren’t fond of us in the kingdom, or even here in Ja-Wen.”
“So, the report could be genuine,” Ko mused. “I admit, I don’t know who all of my people are.”
“And there’s a retired constable from Harip who has been making inquiries into my speaking engagements,” Talya added. The lizardman tensed up, his knuckle scales whitening as he gripped the spear hard.
“Harip. Isn’t that,” he prompted. Talya nodded.
“Yes, the village that Toka burned to the ground. Someone survived, and quite possibly knows the truth about what happened there. If that constable has any connection to this goblin, we could have a real problem on our hands, all four of us.” Ko started toward the brackets that had hosted his spear, setting it back into place.
“What do you propose, Talya? Toka is practically untouchable, a magical advisor to a Graneck prince. Jack has virtually no ties to anyone or anything, and no history really to speak of before our exploits with him. The only two people with anything to lose are you and I, if you follow my logic.” He set the weapon into its spot, but kept his eyes up on it. “It is a small sacrifice.”
“Maybe for you,” said the career criminal, swooping toward him, staring him down from the side. “I’ve come to enjoy my current position in the world, and I don’t need someone, anyone, getting nosy about the specifics of the war.”
“That wouldn’t be a problem, if you hadn’t penned a whole bestselling book about it all,” Ko retorted evenly. He angled only his pupils over at her, lending his profile a queer aspect. “You couldn’t let well enough alone, though. You had to make as large and swift a profit from the whole ordeal as possible.”
“Like you haven’t benefitted from your reputation as one of the Saviors of Graneck when putting together your little band of thugs? We both have something to lose, and so do Toka and Jack. We should at least try to get in touch with them.” Ko’s eyes finally rolled back toward his weapon, and he seemed to loosen up a little.
“I’ll go talk to Toka,” the lizardman said. “You know Ressling better than I, can track him down easier. We can meet back here as a group, try to piece together exactly what’s going on.”
“Sounds like a plan.” Talya got to the sliding front door of the building and looked back to the lizardman, his back still to her, eyes aimed toward the spear. “Jarek? Do you think they know about, um, you know?”
“We should pray they don’t,” he answered.
**
It was several days before all four of them were back together, meeting on a windy, damp Saturday morning at the diner, with Steve the rat enjoying the comfort of a tiny bean bag cushion Azira had picked up from a sundry goods store so he wouldn’t be up on the table, garnering displeased or disgusted looks from the staff and other diners. Before they had even ordered their coffee, Bruce had slapped down a copy of the Ja-Wen Sun in the middle of the table, turned and folded to the third page. At the top, above the fold, stood in bold print the headline, ‘Jarek Ko’s Protection Un-Professionals?’
The goblin skirmisher had been too excited to help himself, and had snatched the paper up to read the story. He chortled every now and then as he read through the article, finally relenting and handing it over to Melissa. Though the folks at the Sun had apparently added a little flavor text to their version of the wire story, she too found herself quite amused by the success of their first collective blow against the Saviors of Graneck. That amusement ended within the last paragraph, however.
“Shit,” she muttered as their waitress set their mugs down with a steaming carafe of coffee. “Um, can we get another minute to look over the menu,” Melissa asked, and the waitress nodded mutely and slipped away. “Guys, this could be bad. They printed my full name,” she said, handing the paper across to Bruce.
“I saw that,” said the retired constable, tucking the paper into his bag under the table. “But they didn’t print where you’re from or where you reside, which is a plus. All they’ll know is that you’re a human woman named Melissa Chandi, and that you live in the Kingdom of Graneck. It’s not a large nation, but it IS an entire country they’ll have to look over.”
“Pardon me,” said Steve, holding up one tiny finger on his forepaw. “But, didn’t you say you knew Jack Ressling growing up?”
“Yeah, so?”
“So wouldn’t he have a pretty good idea where you ended up,” the rat pointed out. Azira felt a twisting in his gut. “And there’s not exactly a great wealth of goblins here in Bronze Pot, not that I’ve seen. Maybe ten, eleven of yous,” he added, looking up at the skirmisher.
“They won’t come looking,” Bruce contended, closing his menu and setting it in the small stack in the center of the table with Melissa’s and Azira’s. “Sure, the story’s out there, but it isn’t front page stuff, and it likely won’t concern anyone but Ko. They won’t move on it.” He cleared his throat and took a sip of his coffee before continuing. “We should discuss our next idea, figure out who we take a swipe at now.”
“Toca Mano is probably going to be the hardest,” Azira said. “He’s practically attached to the prince’s hip, attends him at every function he travels to.” The goblin skirmisher leaned back as their waitress began setting their plates down before them, sitting up to snag a triangular wedge of buttered toast and ramming half of it in his mouth. He chewed swiftly, swallowing hard, then folded his hands together under his chin, elbows braced on either side of his plate. “What do we really know about the elf,” he asked, almost rhetorically.
Melissa reached under her chair and pulled up her satchel, from which she took her copy of Talya Jacobson’s memoir. She thumbed back through it to the back, then rifled through a chunk of the book until she landed on the directed page. She scanned the text, and without looking up from the page, she said, “It says here that he received a great deal of his instruction in the arcane arts while serving as a member of The Association of Elemental Sorcerors, in Palen.”
“Does that help us out somehow,” Steve asked.
“It may,” said Melissa. She closed the book and shoved it back into the satchel, then took a quick bite of her eggs. “It’s a little like Jack; there may well be something in Mano’s past with that guild up in Palen that could be brought to light, something he’d want to keep quiet.” Azira wondered how they were all going to get to the metropolis known to many as the ‘Capital of Magic’ in the realms of Tamalaria, but his musing didn’t last long.
“I can purchase train tickets for us all,” said Bruce around a mouthful of food. “Norris Station is only a couple of miles north, we can take a direct run up to Palen from there.”
“Isn’t that going to be expensive,” the rat inquired.
“Not really,” Bruce replied after he swallowed. “Azira and myself can offer our services as onboard security for the trip to get a discount, you’ll be hidden in Az’s bag, and Melissa’s ticket may be full price, but even then, it’s only one full-priced ticket for me to pick up.” The quartet all concurred over the next few minutes that they would take an extra day to prepare, then head to Norris Station to take the three-day train ride up to Palen together.
They’d succeeded in landing a blow against one of the Saviors of Graneck; with any luck, they’d find enough ammo in Palen to land another.